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Connected car parade

Automakers have linked vehicles to wireless networks for things like navigation and road side assistance. But slowly, they’re leveraging wireless connectivity in cars to explore more advance features such as alerting drivers when they’re too close to another vehicle.

“In the old days, the least interesting hall in CES was the car hall because there was nothing there but load speakers,” said McCracken. “Now it is one of the most interesting parts of the show because cars are becoming really sophisticated. All of the car companies are doing stuff involving the Internet, and no two car companies have exactly the same approach.”

Automakers exhibiting at this year’s show will be Audi, Chevrolet, Chrysler, Ford, Hyundai, Kia, Lexus and Subaru. They have more than 100,000 square feet of combined exhibit space.

“People are basically buying cars now and looking less at horsepower and more at technology,” Shapiro said. “To me, the trend with cars if very clear. It’s wireless Internet connectivity. It’s starting with GPS, vehicle information about traffic. It’s shifting to collision avoidance and then in 10 or 20 years — or however long it takes to get there — to driverless cars.”

Ultra high definition

Over the past couple of years, TV makers have been tossing out features like 3-D and Internet-connected smart TVs that they hoped would inspire consumers to upgrade to new sets.

They didn’t stick. So this year, TV outfits are floating new bait called Ultra HD.

Also known as 4K-by-2K resolution, these Ultra HD TVs boost the number of pixels in the screen well above levels in current high definition sets — either twice or four times as many depending on the display.

“If you think about smartphones and tablets, there has been race to cram greater pixel density into the displays for higher resolution,” said Paul Gagnon, director of North American TV research at NPD DisplaySearch. “And that same trend is starting to work its way into the TV business.”

Manufacturers showed off some of these sets last year. They definitely stand out, even though some analysts claim the human eye can’t detect the pixel difference at typical viewing distance.

“If you see a really good display with really good 4K content, it almost looks three dimensional,” said Gagnon. “You don’t need 3D gimmickry to make it look three dimensional.”

The problem is there isn’t much content. Many movies today are shot in Ultra HD resolution, but they’re not available outside of the theater.

“The sticking point is how are you going to bring it into the home because a 4K movie is going to be a huge file,” said Gagnon. “It’s too big to stream over a network. It’s not compatible with current broadcast, cable or satellite distribution standards, and the Blu-ray standard doesn’t quite support it yet either. So there are still some kinks to work out.”

TV makers are hopeful, however, because the first HD televisions faced the same problems. Consumers still bought those sets.